


The Order of Things

by PotionsMistressM



Category: Pretty Little Liars
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-14
Updated: 2014-02-14
Packaged: 2018-01-12 07:26:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 456
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1183510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PotionsMistressM/pseuds/PotionsMistressM
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Spencer's way of dealing with anxiety</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Order of Things

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Headcanon challenge at LJ's LiarsLand.

There were four bookcases of varying heights and depths in Spencer Hastings's bedroom, and she knew exactly which book went in each spot by heart. Because, of course, everything was logical, straight-forward, and organized. Disorganized... well, _anything_ , made Spencer itch. Once Toby had pulled out a battered old copy of _Great Expectations_ , flipped through it, and then shoved it back in place, though not quite _all the way_ back into place. He began speaking, but Spencer couldn't hear a word he said; her eyes kept flashing back to the shelf where the rogue novel sat, brazenly out of line with the other books all around it. Toby kept talking, but the pressure in Spencer's head built up and up until there was absolutely nothing else she could do except jump up from her bed, shove the offending book back into place, and heave a deep sigh of relief.

Fiction and nonfiction must never be mixed on the same shelf, and they may share a bookcase only in the most dire of cricumstances. Every shelf of books in Spencer's room was arranged by theme or topic, then alphabetized by author, and finally alphabetized by the title. Unless, of course, the author had written a series, then the books must be shelved in series order- alphabetized within the author's body of work under the title of the series. Obviously. Stephen King got three shelves to himself; Richard Bachman (his pseudonym) was a subset at the end of the third shelf- alphabetized within itself, naturally. Her interior design books- including a birthday present from Hanna called "The Big Ass Book of Home Decor"- were hidden in plain sight on the bottom shelf of the bookcase closest to her bed, with a row of celebrity biographies just above. The fluffy, unimportant books her family would look down on. A Hastings should never waste time on such unacademic pursuits.

When she got stressed, Spencer found it soothing- therapeutic even- to pull everything from the shelves and try an devise some new kind of organization. When Alison first went missing, she had toyed with the Dewey Decimal system, but with so few books in her collection (relatively) it had seemed random and unruly. After the first few A notes, a system based on the country of the author's birth seemed logical. And though the act of organizing helped to calm her, a new system never lasted. Nothing was ever able to fill the space the alphabet held in her heart.

Thinking on it now, she wasn't so surprised she'd ended up in Radley. She always had been wound a little tightly. But she couldn't help it. There was an order to things, and no acceptable reason for anything to defy that order.


End file.
